---
name: deep-research-cc02946346e8
description: Multi-source deep research using firecrawl and exa MCPs. Searches the web, synthesizes findings, and delivers cited reports with source attribution. Use when the user wants thorough research on any topic with evidence and citations.
origin: ecc
---

# Deep Research

> **Drift-prone skill.** Firecrawl/Exa MCP tool names, quotas, and result
> shapes change. Verify the configured MCP tools and current API docs before
> promising coverage or quoting live source counts.

Produce thorough, cited research reports from multiple web sources using firecrawl and exa MCP tools.

## When to Activate

- User asks to research any topic in depth
- Competitive analysis, technology evaluation, or market sizing
- Due diligence on companies, investors, or technologies
- Any question requiring synthesis from multiple sources
- User says "research", "deep dive", "investigate", or "what's the current state of"

## MCP Requirements

At least one of:
- **firecrawl** — `firecrawl_search`, `firecrawl_scrape`, `firecrawl_crawl`
- **exa** — `web_search_exa`, `web_search_advanced_exa`, `crawling_exa`

Both together give the best coverage. Configure in `~/.codex.json` or `~/.codex/config.toml`.

## Workflow

### Step 1: Understand the Goal

Ask 1-2 quick clarifying questions:
- "What's your goal — learning, making a decision, or writing something?"
- "Any specific angle or depth you want?"

If the user says "just research it" — skip ahead with reasonable defaults.

### Step 2: Plan the Research

Break the topic into 3-5 research sub-questions. Example:
- Topic: "Impact of AI on healthcare"
  - What are the main AI applications in healthcare today?
  - What clinical outcomes have been measured?
  - What are the regulatory challenges?
  - What companies are leading this space?
  - What's the market size and growth trajectory?

### Step 3: Execute Multi-Source Search

For EACH sub-question, search using available MCP tools:

**With firecrawl:**
```
firecrawl_search(query: "<sub-question keywords>", limit: 8)
```

**With exa:**
```
web_search_exa(query: "<sub-question keywords>", numResults: 8)
web_search_advanced_exa(query: "<keywords>", numResults: 5, startPublishedDate: "2025-01-01")
```

**Search strategy:**
- Use 2-3 different keyword variations per sub-question
- Mix general and news-focused queries
- Aim for 15-30 unique sources total
- Prioritize: academic, official, reputable news > blogs > forums

### Step 4: Deep-Read Key Sources

For the most promising URLs, fetch full content:

**With firecrawl:**
```
firecrawl_scrape(url: "<url>")
```

**With exa:**
```
crawling_exa(url: "<url>", tokensNum: 5000)
```

Read 3-5 key sources in full for depth. Do not rely only on search snippets.

### Step 5: Synthesize and Write Report

Structure the report:

```markdown
# [Topic]: Research Report
*Generated: [date] | Sources: [N] | Confidence: [High/Medium/Low]*

## Executive Summary
[3-5 sentence overview of key findings]

## 1. [First Major Theme]
[Findings with inline citations]
- Key point ([Source Name](url))
- Supporting data ([Source Name](url))

## 2. [Second Major Theme]
...

## 3. [Third Major Theme]
...

## Key Takeaways
- [Actionable insight 1]
- [Actionable insight 2]
- [Actionable insight 3]

## Sources
1. [Title](url) — [one-line summary]
2. ...

## Methodology
Searched [N] queries across web and news. Analyzed [M] sources.
Sub-questions investigated: [list]
```

### Step 6: Deliver

- **Short topics**: Post the full report in chat
- **Long reports**: Post the executive summary + key takeaways, save full report to a file

## Parallel Research with Subagents

For broad topics, use OpenAI Codex's Task tool to parallelize:

```
Launch 3 research agents in parallel:
1. Agent 1: Research sub-questions 1-2
2. Agent 2: Research sub-questions 3-4
3. Agent 3: Research sub-question 5 + cross-cutting themes
```

Each agent searches, reads sources, and returns findings. The main session synthesizes into the final report.

## Quality Rules

1. **Every claim needs a source.** No unsourced assertions.
2. **Cross-reference.** If only one source says it, flag it as unverified.
3. **Recency matters.** Prefer sources from the last 12 months.
4. **Acknowledge gaps.** If you couldn't find good info on a sub-question, say so.
5. **No hallucination.** If you don't know, say "insufficient data found."
6. **Separate fact from inference.** Label estimates, projections, and opinions clearly.

## Examples

```
"Research the current state of nuclear fusion energy"
"Deep dive into Rust vs Go for backend services in 2026"
"Research the best strategies for bootstrapping a SaaS business"
"What's happening with the US housing market right now?"
"Investigate the competitive landscape for AI code editors"
```


---
Source attribution: mturac
Original project: https://github.com/mturac/everything-openai-codex/blob/b5057da5f42ed6b12cd3a59e89af0ccd12cff7c2/skills/deep-research/SKILL.md
License: MIT
License information: https://opensource.org/license/mit
Original upstream instructions; downloaded from Mega AI Hub.

## Upstream license notice

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2026 Mehmet Turac

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all
copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
SOFTWARE.


## Additional upstream notices

deep-research-cc02946346e8/DAVEAI-UPSTREAM-NOTICE.md

# Notices and Acknowledgements

Everything OpenAI Codex is a Codex-focused adaptation inspired by the public
[`affaan-m/everything-claude-code`](https://github.com/affaan-m/everything-claude-code)
project.

Respect to Affaan Mustafa and the contributors to that project for making the
multi-harness agent operating-system pattern visible in the open.

This repository adapts the public idea and workflow surface for OpenAI Codex:
names, defaults, install targets, docs, validators, and cross-harness guidance
are maintained here for the Codex-oriented project.


# Mega AI Hub resource metadata

Creator / publisher: mturac
Original project: https://github.com/mturac/everything-openai-codex/blob/b5057da5f42ed6b12cd3a59e89af0ccd12cff7c2/skills/deep-research/SKILL.md
Attribution basis: Source repository record

Fields of work: Data & Analytics, Education & Research, Marketing, Product Management, Sales
Roles: Business Development, Data Analyst, Marketing Analyst, Product Manager, Researcher
Specialties: Specialty not specified
Tools: Exa, Firecrawl
Country applicability: Country not specified
Classification basis: Source catalog labels
Instruction SHA-256: ed0a62b3965010310760aadca0a78c6d475c17b3f2a59c914ba916ac0ca63e99